Changeling
by Aecides
Summary: She spent her life playing the game of politics and manipulation, but the game changes when a young Heiress finds herself in Haven. The City is unfamiliar and unforgiving, can Lyra survive in a world where she can't always talk her way out of trouble and her family ties provide no safety net? Jak/OC Romance/humour/adventure. Contains swearing, violence and suggestive scenes.
1. Chapter 1

**Authors note.  
**Hello and welcome to my story! I might have more to say later, but for now I will let you get on with reading it as soon as I've stopped myself getting slapped with copyright infringement.

Jak and Daxter, and all associated characters, locations names and concepts belong to Naughty Dog. I merely play in their sandbox and feel thankful that they're kind enough not to stomp on my castle. If it's in this story and is not accredited to someone else, it belongs to me.

* * *

Lyra could hardly keep her eyes open as the venom coursed through her system, the world was hazy as she felt heard footsteps coming towards her.  
"Sedate her."  
She felt a needle pierce through her skin and welcomed the relief from the venoms pain.  
Waking up groggily she heard movement about her, she must be in a hospital. But then why did she have the feeling she wasn't safe?  
Keeping her eyes closed and being careful not to move, Lyra noted that the pain of the venom was no longer there. It had either been cured or simply run its course.  
"The green eco did its job, the venom has been flushed out but..."  
_'Green eco? Is that some kind of anti-venom?'  
_"But what?"

"She reacted strangely to it, instead of slowly sinking into her body it was absorbed immediately. Then it seemed to travel through her as if she was directing it instead of the way it usually just circulates until it's used up. It was also used incredibly efficiently, there was even enough left to fix the deformity in her ears."  
_'Deformity? My ears aren't deformed.'  
_"Did you get scans?"  
"Yes Sir, both before and during the application of the eco."  
"Show me."  
This wasn't a hospital, in a hospital nobody was called Sir and Lyra was fairly sure the beds weren't made of metal. She assumed it was metal, whatever she was laid out on it was cold and uncomfortable. She was glad she'd decided to keep quiet.  
"Amazing, this subject could be just what we need for Project Changeling."  
'_Subject? Project Changeling? This definitely isn't a hospital. It sounds more like...a lab. From the use of Sir it can be assumed a military lab.'  
_"Sir look at her vitals. She's awake."  
She heard quick footsteps heading towards her, a large hand grabbing her and shaking her.  
_'Don't let them know you heard.'_  
"Where...where am I? What's going on? I remember...being stung."  
"Where are you from? The scans show almost no eco exposure, it's like before you came here you'd never been anywhere near it."  
_'Don't answer, deflect.'  
_"What's eco? Why is everything so shiny and pink? The sparklies are pretty."  
The large, armoured man grunted as she looked around in a blissful daze.  
"She's clearly either simple or still recovering, prepare an eco tank for her immediately, she'll be of no other use."  
"Yes Sir."  
A few minutes later Lyra was lifted by two more strangely armoured men, one taking each arm and dragging her into the next room. There was a large tank, filled with a thick yellow and green liquid. There were swirls of red too, and occasionally...blue sparks?

What felt like an oxygen tube was pushed into each of her nostrils before she was raised up and dumped carelessly into the tank. She submerged completely almost instantly and it burned, it burned worse than the venom, worse than anything she'd ever felt before. She opened her mouth to scream and instantly regretted it as the liquid went in, burning her mouth and throat as well. Lyra was almost certain she could feel her skin dissolving, but that couldn't be right, it was taking too long. There was another sensation too, under the horrific pain. It felt soft, soothing, but not nearly soothing enough to subtract from the agony.  
Why did she feel like she was dissolving?  
She didn't have time to try and work it out as she felt her brain begin to shut down. No doubt a defence mechanism to avoid this pain.  
As her mind pulled her in, trying to isolate her from what every nerve in her body was screaming, she managed a final question before slipping into a dream like state.  
_'How did this happen?'_

As if glad for the further chance to distract her, Lyra's mind began to provide answers.

_She was staring so intently into her book that Dan was almost worried his sister was going to be absorbed by it. He'd never understood the way she read, they were twins but aside from a few common interests and a far above average intelligence they really didn't have a huge amount in common. He'd always been hands on and content to learn as he went, but Lyra refused to make a sandwich without first consulting a book and reading up on the correct buttering technique, the different ways of cutting it and which fillings would strike the best balance between taste and a nutritional, balanced diet._

She was reading when she first noticed it, she don't know how she'd missed it before. It was so obvious. Cultures all over the world, entirely isolated from each other, and they'd developed alphabets with some admittedly large differences, but ultimately the same basic structure. Civilisations had leapt ahead in advancement around similar times. The Roman empire in particular gained knowledge that once lost took hundreds of years to rediscover.  
Isolated and widespread cultures alike had idols that they worshipped and myths that were astoundingly similar, even though it was absolutely impossible for them to have been in contact with each other.

Grabbing books on the history of other cultures she'd begun reading through them, page by page, detail by detail. She'd been up all night, two nights in fact, so engrossed in her work that she barely noticed that she'd been reading books and her notes and making new notes and cross referencing for over 30 hours. Romans, Aztecs, Native Americans, Ancient China, Egypt, India - all of them shared details they shouldn't, smaller cultures did too. But it seemed every great empire had been established by an inexplicable social or technological leap. Dan had later told her that he'd found her asleep, still skimming pages and furiously scribbling notes.

A hand was on her shoulder, shaking her. She remembered, it was Dan trying to wake her up. He said that even asleep she just complained that he nearly made her ruin her notes.  
But this hand was shaking her roughly, Dan's shake had been gentle, brotherly. This wasn't him.

"So, you survived."  
"How? I was...burning...dissolving."  
She looked at herself to confirm what she felt, she was absolutely fine. There wasn't a mark on her.

"It was a dream?"  
"No, no it wasn't. What you remember is exactly what happened. You see, it's the mix of yellow and green eco. It took us a few tries to balance it properly, but the yellow eco burns through your flesh and muscle, while the green eco repairs it."  
She stared at him, briefly speechless.  
"Why? Why would you do that?"  
"In the hope that with eco running through your system like that for long enough, you'll adapt and be able to store it."  
"But, how can I survive? Even with the...green eco? The stress that would put on my body is incredible."  
"Yes, we found that out through trial and error too. We've added red eco to fortify your body, and blue eco to increase your metabolism. It will speed up the process and help you survive it, but you have about twenty days, then no amount of red and green eco can keep your body from just giving up. Better hope you adapt before then."  
Lyra went back to staring at him blankly. He didn't care, there was no concern for her, just the hard fact that if she didn't produce the desired result quickly enough they'd let the experiment kill her.

It was only when she looked at the man's face to see if there was any sympathy there that she noticed his ears, they were incredibly long and pointed. She reached up and touched her own, letting out a small yelp when she felt them to be just as long and pointed. The man laughed.  
"Yeah, the green eco fixed your deformity."  
So they were all like this. Why else would they think her previous ears had been a deformity, and this was the correct way to appear? That meant they weren't human, and unless she'd missed something big, that meant she wasn't on Earth. Her revelation was interrupted by a plate being slapped down onto the table next to her.  
"There's your rations, you've got five minutes to eat before you go back in the tank."  
She felt her heart rate soar. She couldn't go back in there.

_'Deal with that next, five minutes to eat, use them first, no point in plotting an escape and collapsing from malnutrition.'_  
She looked at the plate nervously. Things were clearly different here, what if the food was toxic to her?  
Well, one way to find out. She carefully placed a bit of food on her tongue, hoping it would warn her if the food was dangerous to her body. It tasted...ok, pleasant would not be the word to describe it, but it didn't taste like it would kill her.

Lyra barely managed to finish her food before she was dumped back into the eco tank. This time she didn't scream, and felt her mind recognise the sensation and instantly try to protect her again, taking her back to earlier memories, trying to help her make sense of how she got here.

_"What is it Dan?"  
"You were uh...sleep studying again. How do you even do that?"  
She'd been doing it for years, she'd fall asleep studying and just continue. He was never sure whether to be concerned or jealous, she always awoke fairly well rested and with a great deal more work done. But it couldn't be healthy, could it? More concerning, it was always a signal she'd found something that bothered her. Some part of her dissection of the entire history of the world wasn't fitting in to how things should have gone.  
"I honestly don't know. I think of what I need to do and if it's important I just keep doing it."  
"What is it this time?"  
She considered how to explain, how to tell someone that the world was wrong without sounding insane. So far there were only three explanations for the connections that accounted for everything. A hugely advanced culture spread all over the world before history began, died out and parts were eventually rediscovered but integrated instead of recorded as history. There was some way of communicating that was either lost, destroyed or forgotten, possibly one people weren't even entirely aware of...subconscious telepathic communication of ideas. Finally, and most likely, the myths were true and the most likely things to cause those myths would be aliens. How do you tell someone that you were sleep studying because you think another species influenced the evolution of your planet without sounding insane?  
"Uh...well...there are a lot of statues and stories"  
"Yes Lyra, amazingly, in the entire history of humanity, we've come up with a few."  
"BUT THEY'RE THE SAME!"  
"So someone was stealing someone else's ideas? That's hardly a revelation."  
"No, you don't understand. Cultures, entirely separate, they never ever met, they have the same myths and statues"  
"I think you'd better explain properly"  
Despite their differences, this was one of the reasons she couldn't ask for a better twin brother than Dan. He sat patiently, listening to her explanation, her theories, skimming her notes for a full two hours before he nodded and stood up.  
"You do seem to have a point. Question is, what are you going to do about it?"  
She considered this question carefully. She had theory, not proof. Even if she continued her research and factored in every similarity, every anomaly in humanities cultural and technological development, who would believe her?  
"I don't really know..."  
"You could just accept that you're the sanest crazy conspiracy theorist ever?"  
She had to smile, along with unending patience for what she fully acknowledged was a series of quirks that gave him an outright strange twin sister, this was one of his best qualities. He was an absolute genius, smarter than her by far, but he never took anything seriously and had the unique talent of dragging her down to his humorous level. That information however, didn't stop her from elbowing him in the stomach as he stood behind her.  
"Ow."  
He slapped her round the head and she stood up as quickly as he backed away, raising his guard. They both knew what was coming.  
"Outside?"  
"Outside."_  
_There was an agreement with their Mother. Living in the countryside and being very well off, they had a large amount of land and a multi-tutored upbringing. Several martial arts tutors were included in this and it had led the usual sibling scuffles to be more destructive than usual. Their Mother actively encouraged them to practice against each other, but only in the sand school, this rule being the result of several expensive antiques falling victim to a deflected kick or a missed tackle.  
They quickly made their way down to the ground floor, out the back door and through a field to the sand school, Dan slipping in his gum shield as they went - it hadn't taken him many practice sessions to realise that Lyra was as good a fighter as him but not nearly as good at holding back enough to ensure everyone left with their teeth intact, over the last few years of wearing his specially moulded gum shield he realised that not using it and keeping his smile intact had been pure luck.  
Reaching the sand school they moved to the middle and both slipped into the starting stance of their preferred forms on reflex. Dan favoured MMA style, having developed a keen interest in Mixed Martial Arts early on, while Lyra favoured Muay Thai mixed with Judo, a healthy dose of high and spin kicks and a disturbingly effective combination with her gymnastic abilities.  
Looking at her stance and instantly recognising what her first move would be he raised a boxers guard as she spun towards him and struck towards his throat with her elbow, a move that if it hit left him winded while he rasped for breath and had landed her a one hit win more times than he cared to count. While he blocked her opening attack he hooked her ankle with his to bring her to the ground, only to curse as mid fall she mixed in that annoying gymnast training and turned her fall into a back flip, barely leaving him time to lean back and dodge the uppercut her foot was making towards his chin in the process. They circled each other with a few metres between them, searching for weakness. Dan saw one, her guard was slightly too low on her left, he considered striking it when he remembered exploiting the same weakness a few months ago and getting jabbed in the process. It was a trap, she knew his defence was far better than his offense and so she was trying to lure him into an attack. Instead he rechecked his own guard and adjusted until he was satisfied it was perfect. Her preferred style left her extremely vulnerable compared to him in attack, and his superior strength meant that without her putting a run or a spin into her attacks she could do little damage. He only had to counter the first strike each time and then she was forced to either retreat or give him a weight advantage.  
Lyra made her move, springing back and instantly flipping forwards, twisting at the height of her flip to scythe her foot towards his head as she passed him. He blocked it again but it connected against his wrist with some force and she grinned as she noticed him wince, she'd created a sore spot, a chink in his armour. Grabbing out at her foot he pulled her back as she landed, she was nimble enough not to fall but she was on one foot, facing away from him and off balance. Now was the time to strike. He threw a punch towards her gut, she twisted again, freeing her foot, but still took the blow to the side. Not as bad as it could have been, but she'd just lost a lot of her ability to spin and flip around him without causing herself distracting pain. This had to be finished quickly before he got in another hit.  
She turned and struck towards his face with her palm, he instinctively blocked, realising too late that it was a distraction and Lyra's elbow slammed into his ribcage and she straightened her arm as the elbow hit, bringing her hand under his guard and striking his chin. Grabbing his arm as he staggered back she twisted it round behind him and connected her knee to the back of his, putting her arm around his throat as his leg gave way and he fell to his knees.  
"Give up?"  
He responded by throwing her over his shoulder and putting his foot on her neck as he sprung back to his feet, looking down at her with a smug grin.  
"I win"  
"Don't I get a chance to counter too?"  
"No, I countered because if this was an actual fight all you could have done was choke me, giving me time to counter. If this was an actual fight my boot would have crushed your neck by now."  
"Fine."  
He took his foot away and extended an arm to help her up, grinning in victory and removing his gum shield.  
"Next time, I'm wiping that grin off your face."  
"I don't doubt it. Help me feed the horses?"  
"Sure, well done by the way, you're getting better."  
"An evenly matched practice partner really helps."  
They walked back across the field to the stables near their house, absently wandering into the feed room where Lyra began filling bowls with feed while Dan hoisted a bale of hay onto each shoulder. Heading into the first of the two occupied stables Dan started stuffing a bale into the now empty hay net and Lyra's horse let out an approving noise as she placed the bowl of food down and scratched under his chin. Lyra then promptly let out a yelp as he grabbed her hair, again, she could swear her horse found it funny. He'd always been cheeky but this was like their standing joke, he'd pull her hair and she could swear he laughed when she yelped. Even if he wasn't actually laughing, he definitely always looked pleased with himself.  
As they put the hay and food in the next stable for Dan's horse her brother finally bought up her earlier obsession.  
"So, I know you. You're going to do something, what's the plan?"  
She smiled, he knew that this whole time she'd been thinking about it, planning how to react to this information.  
"Well" she started hesitantly, encouraged by his smiling nod "There's a particular temple in a mountain range in South America, supposedly. It seems to be a central point for a lot of these similarities."  
"Why is it a supposed temple?"  
"Nobody ever actually found it. It's an incredibly difficult journey and the environment there doesn't allow technology to be of much help. Strong EM fields mess up navigational equipment, the terrain can stop an 'all terrain vehicle' from getting far enough to be of any use and it's too misty for a fly by scouting or a drop from a plane. Add to that a series of rare species with venom ranging from causing days of violent convulsions and fever, to near instant death, species that are so rare and isolated nobody has synthesised any kind of anti-venom, and the heavy rain on a steep, muddy mountain that has very few paths, all of which are too narrow for even a small supply wagon, and you have a temple that stops being mentioned other than for how many expeditions died trying to find it."  
"You're going to ask mum and dad to fund an expedition to 'The Temple of Doom' aren't you."  
A statement, not a question. He knew her too well.  
"It's not 'The Temple of Doom' Dan."  
"Sounds fairly doomy to me. They don't let you stay at a friend's house for the night and we're 16. What kind of overly protective parent forbids sleepovers and then allows their 16 year old daughter to death march through a mountain range with complete strangers?"  
"The overly protective, overly ambitious kind that want me to be a world famous expert by 20 and before I even have a degree so they can brag about it to all of their business contacts? Also I was going to downplay the whole 'filled with venomous creatures and only recently known as the likely non-existent temple that's nobody has come back from in two hundred years' side of it."  
"Good point. Go for it."  
She looked at him in shock, did her twin brother, who had once beaten up a boy 3 years older than them for stealing her pencil sharpener, just encourage her to go on a trip that was outright likely to kill her?  
"You...think this is a good idea?"  
"No, but I think you're actually on to something, and that if anyone can do this it's you." he said with a sage and supportive smile, which warped into his usual cheeky grin as he said "Plus if you die, your room's only across the hall from mine and it's the perfect size for an air hockey table."  
"That's your plan? Support me to death and play air hockey?"  
"It's your legacy, with every game I win, I'll think of you!"  
She burst out laughing.  
"I love you Dan, I really do."  
"Love you too sis, now, less talking, more making room for an air hockey table."_

She raised it with her parents and got her brothers support. They downplayed the danger, made the results seem a bit more likely and pointed out that after years of being gossiped about for having a daughter that 'wanted to scrape through dirt for a living' they'd be able to tell every gossip about her history changing discovery and then smugly ask how their child was doing on their management or accounting course.  
Over the next few days arrangements were made, flights booked, experts, survivalists, field doctors, guides and a small workforce were hired. Equipment was bought and Lyra had to admit, no expense was spared.  
Six months, they left in six months.


	2. Chapter 2

Lyra woke up on a lab table, she recognised the feeling of the cold metal all over her back.  
'_All over my back? But that means...'  
_Bolting upright she screamed "WHERE ARE MY CLOTHES?!"  
A scientist who looked to be in his late twenties spun round from the screen he'd been studying in response to her outburst, before promptly looking away.  
"We uh...well. The yellow eco would burn them so they're removed before you're put in. We did have you covered with a blanket but it seems to have um...fallen...when you sat up."  
Looking down and realising that in her horror at being naked she'd given the entire science team what was most likely their first proper look at her bare chest, she grabbed the blanket and pulled it back up.  
'_Stupid, stupid, stupid...'  
_"I wasn't naked the first two times I was put into the tank."  
"No, you weren't naked the first time. We put you in standard subject clothing after we treated the venom, the commander was just too impatient to bother with procedure."  
"What about the second time?"  
"I wasn't there but according to files you weren't clothed."  
"What...I w..."  
She cut off as she thought back to the look the man she now assumed was the commander had been giving her. Going by that look she had been naked and simply hadn't noticed.  
Lyra found it nothing short of amazing that given her current situation of being constantly burnt alive, the thought that she'd been naked and not tried to stop him from seeing anything still made her blush.  
_'Ah well, what's done is done, time to try and find out more.'  
_"Excuse me, what are you doing? Am I done?"  
The scientist turned to her with what she recognised as the 'I'm glad SOMEONE bothered to ask' face. This man was about to yield every bit of information she could ever want just because nobody else cared.  
"Well. Currently I'm studying your results, it's absolutely fascinating you know, you're not bonding to the eco like we expected, but you do appear to be slowly mutating in contact with it. Small amounts of your body are adapting to hold it without being destroyed by the energy. It's a truly interesting process, you appear to have absolutely no reaction to it other than the usual effects and then all of a sudden, a genetic change just pops out of nowhere on the scanner. The affected cells develop a remarkable storage capacity for eco and just start draining all they can hold from the tank. You're currently at 3% cell mutation. We estimate your body could achieve up to 96% cell mutation with enough time."  
"How?"  
"Well, your cells seem to mutate naturally when exposed to eco. Wherever you're from we know there's no eco there since nothing you own showed any sign of exposure, we suspect that simply being here where eco exists will eventually trigger the mutation. We expect it to double each time, so the next time it happens you'll go to 6% cell mutation. We can speed it up by keeping you in the eco tank but unfortunately we expect it to take longer and longer each time."  
"How long are you going to keep me in there?"  
"We're going to get it over with as fast as possible, please be assured that we'll be working day and night to find other ways to speed this up. And you'll have all the pain relief we can provide without slowing the process."  
Lyra had a bad feeling, cold need for information blocked out the urge to panic as he offered desperate assurances.  
"How long?"  
"Well we're going to have to remove you for a week every thirty days but...a year in total, the stimulants it requires to happen that fast will keep you awake for most of it...you will sleep sometimes though."  
The scientist had mumbled it, staring at the floor as he delivered the news.  
"WHAT?!"  
The scientist hurried to explain.  
"Well the Baron demands we get you to your maximum power to fight in the war, in the eco tank that will take a year. Outside of the eco tank, anywhere between three and five years, depending on exposure."  
"You can't put me in that for a year!"  
"We don't have a choice."  
"You always have a choice."  
"No, we haven't. He'll kill us."  
Lyra hated this logic. There was always a choice.  
"Exactly, you have a choice. You can choose to do what's right, or to save your own lives. It's not a nice choice but it's there, you could even choose to do what's right and run, it's not like you'll definitely be killed."  
The scientist looked away again, mumbling in apology.  
"I'm sorry...we have no choice."  
As the scientist signalled to the guards outside that he'd finished his tests, Lyra realised she was about to be taken back to the eco tank. Caring little for her now exposed body she fought as hard as she could when they started dragging her from the room. Before the door closed she managed to get a footing long enough to spit towards the scientist and scream.  
"YOU DISGUST ME!"  
As the door to their lab closed the science team in the room all avoided eye contact with each other, trying to busy themselves with their work. The scientist she had been addressing muttered "I disgust myself."


	3. Chapter 3

"Jak! Let's go!"  
_'Really' Dax thought 'It's been two years of searching to bust him out of this place and he's climbing a pile of crates during his escape for a single precursor orb. We had hundreds as kids.'  
_"They could be valuable Dax, we always used them as currency right? Well we don't know how many there are here."  
"Shouldn't we be more worried about where HERE is?"  
Dax leaned in close like he was imparting an essential secret.  
"I'll give you a clue, here is filled with people who want to TORTURE and KILL us! Maybe we should focus on not being here?"  
Jak glared as he grabbed the orb.  
"Let's be clear Dax, I'm happy to kill everyone working here. They're all on my list, and sooner or later, they're all getting checked off."  
Dax didn't reply, the way his old friend was acting today scared him a bit, not to mention whatever he'd turned into back in the lab. It seemed to be linked to Jak getting pissed off, so Dax quickly decided not to piss him off. As Jak pocketed the orb he'd been after, both of them briefly conceded a bit of ground.  
"Those orbs do seem pretty rare here Jak"  
"You're right though, we should get going. I just hope I run into a few people on the way out..."  
Dax leapt onto Jak's shoulder and both of them instantly relaxed, realising just how much they'd missed that feeling. Even after all of this time, it felt right. Sat on this shoulder was where Dax was meant to be. The duo was back, and they were ready to cause some trouble.

As they left the fortress Jak looked around in disgust. The people walking these streets had no pride, no passion. They hung their heads and shuffled about whatever pointless, menial task they were engaged in.  
It almost sickened him to surrender another bit of dignity by hanging his head and blending in with the solemn crowd, avoiding the patrols outside the fortress instead of walking with his head held high and tearing through all who tried to stop him. But any price was worth it to survive long enough to reach Praxis. Any price was worth summoning all the dark eco that had been pumped into him and finding out how the Baron's body handled having it shot into him in unrelenting arcs of dark lightning for hours at a time. Jak found himself filling with rage and confidence as he considered the possibilities of being along in a room Praxis. Perhaps he'd transform, let the Baron find out just how effective the Dark Warrior program had been, how easily the monster he'd created would be able to tear through him until that oversized, overly proud man was a pile of blood and muscle that you couldn't tell apart from Lurker shark bait.

These thoughts were shattered as Jak saw an old man wandering through the street with a child. He wasn't sure why, but this man looked like he had answers. Not just that...he looked like...like Jak should be angry with him. Even in his irrational state it seemed insane, but he felt some kind of mild loathing looking at the old man and the child, like he wanted to push him away and shout at him for being too close to the perfectly comfortable little boy.  
'_Of all the people in this place, why do I want to vent by beating an old man?'  
_That was when the old man made possibly the worst decision of his life, he approached Jak.  
"Hello strangers, my name is Kor, may I help you?"  
The old man grabbed Jak gently by the elbow to hold his attention, Jak felt the rage build again. Grabbing the old man's shoulder he decided to make the old man useful in the hope it would soothe the rage.  
"You look like a reasonably smart man, I want information! Where the hell am I? "  
The old man seemed surprisingly unconcerned by Jak's rather aggressive approach.  
"Well my angry young friend, you are a guest of his majesty Baron Praxis" Kor gave a sarcastic royal wave at the man's name, clearly feeling no affection for the man. Jak felt his inexplicable anger at the old man subside slightly. Kor continued with the same distaste.  
"Ruler of glorious Haven City"  
Looking around, Jak could see why 'glorious' had been said with a note of sarcasm.  
"I was just a guest in the good Baron's prison"  
"Inside a cell or inside the City, walls surround us both. We are all his prisoners."  
Jak felt a twinge of annoyance return at the idea that this old man was comparing their situations, but he conceded to himself that what he had said was most likely true. The people he'd seen in the streets suddenly made sense. They'd been born prisoners, free thought hadn't just been crushed out of them, they'd never been taught it existed.

Kor began shuffling away.  
"Talk about being in the wrong place at the wrong time, I'd move on if I were you."  
He was clearly moving as fast as he could, pushing the kid ahead of him.  
"By order of His Eminence the Grand Protector of Haven City Baron Praxis, everyone in this section is hereby under arrest on suspicion of harbouring underground fugitives. Surrender and die."  
Jak was horrified to note that a few people were actually approaching to surrender to the guards that had just threatened to kill them. He was more horrified to note that Daxter was about to add his thoughts to the situation.  
"Uhhh, excuse me, Sir? Don't you mean surrender OR DIE?"  
"Not in this City!" Kor exclaimed "Protect us from these guards and I'll introduce you to someone who can help you."  
Despite his inexplicable dislike for the old man, Jak didn't hesitate for even a moment. Kill Krimzon Guard, protect a kid, vent his anger on something deserving AND get introduced to help for it? It was an offer without a downside. Jak's face set into a dark grin as he anticipated the satisfaction of breaking the red armoured bastards moving towards him.  
On his second kill, he felt his suppressed rage combine with his growing bloodlust, and that's when the transformation happened.

Jak was only half familiar with the feeling of being a prisoner in his own body. He'd transformed before during the experiments, but he'd been unable to move then anyway. The transformation was a welcome release from the pain - while Jak maintained senses, pain in his transformed state was severely dulled and the feeling of pleasure the beast felt at being touched by dark eco was far greater than the minor, slightly tingly discomfort.  
This was entirely different. The monster inside him was in control, and able to assert that control, and Jak could feel the creatures elation in its new found freedom. It attacked the guards with several months of pent up bloodlust, leaving Jak wondering if he could vomit inside his own mind as he watched, even felt, his claws rip through armour into flesh, tasted the blood as the beast sunk it's teeth deep into someone's throat before throwing its head back violently, ripping so much of their neck away the corpse was left nearly beheaded. More guards arrived and Jak's horror at the sensations his body was sending him, while remaining entirely beyond his control, only increased. He could sense the beasts emotions, it was enjoying this. If that hadn't been sickening enough, the enjoyment sparked creativity. Jak found himself banging on the walls of his mind, desperately trying to break free from the cage of his own body as it began to experiment. Discovering it could unleash charges of dark eco, it held one man by the throat, watching with glee as the dark eco it was sending into its hand blackened and boiled the flesh from the KG's bones. Another was pinned and slowly, experimentally, carved apart, the monster discovering which parts of flesh were easiest to cut, which organs it could carve into without instantly killing the victim. Jak was retching in revulsion. The guards deserved death certainly, they even deserved the slightly slower than it needed to be death that Jak would have provided. But this? Nothing deserved this. Nothing except, perhaps, Praxis.

Fortunately Daxter had jumped clear the moment Jak transformed, mercifully, Dax had enough of an idea of what was coming to cover the child's eyes and ears, as well as his own.  
It was only as the monster finished toying and experimenting with the last of several waves that Jak felt anything but a sick, twisted ecstasy coming from the primitive, clearly deranged, mind of the monster that now controlled him. Rage, a familiar feeling of loathing and...fear? What could something this horrific fear? An image flashed as Jak felt another wave of loathing wash over him. The monster was trapped, as he was. He realised it was a memory, the monster remembered what was happening. If the monster remembered this as being trapped, that could only mean one thing.  
Jak started pushing the monster back, summoning his willpower and using all of it to force this creature away from control, he could feel it planning to use the last few moments it got to begin experimenting with the smaller, unarmored version of these new toys. Jak thought of what had happened to the KG and the idea of that happening to this kid gave him the strength he needed to deny the monster those final few moments. He staggered as he regained control of his body, only now realising he was actually reaching towards the child. As the old man, Kor, thanked him and directed him, Jak looked blank. As he stumbled to the Underground HQ he tried not to think of just how close the monster had gotten to the kid and Dax.


	4. Chapter 4

Sir, cell mutation is now at 24%, progressing at expected speeds."  
"Good, how long before her next rest cycle?"  
"Ten days Sir."  
"Very well."  
The commander turned to leave, he didn't like talking to the scientists any more than he had to and watching the girls face twist in pain had gotten boring over a week ago.  
"Uh, Sir?"  
"What is it now?"  
"She's absorbing the eco again."  
"That was expected wasn't it?"  
"Yes Sir, but not at this rate. She's going to -"  
The Commander and Scientists spun towards the tank in unison as they heard a smash, several of the closer scientists that had been working near the tank collapsed to the floor not a moment after the glass broke. The Commander pulled out his Comm. Unit quickly.  
"Subject breach in Project Changeling, initiate a quarantine."

Jogging backwards towards the door he had enough time to see the bodies near the tank twist in contact with a powerful wave of yellow eco, the skin and clothes dissolving at its touch. Grimacing he turned towards the blast door and sprinted through as it began closing. He ignored the cries of the scientists and guards who had been further away, he wouldn't have stopped the door closing even if he could.

Lyra glared around the room, yellow eco radiating from her body in pulses that covered several metres, scorching the walls, ground and anyone unlucky enough to be within that range.

"LET ME OUT!"

The head scientist, cowering on the other side of the room stood up and tried to negotiate.

"We...we can't. It's a quarantine, the door's sealed and we can't over-ride it from in here."  
Lyra felt a passionate fit of rage overcome her again at these words and she began walking towards them, still pulsing yellow eco every few seconds.  
"You'll cook when I'm in range. Give me a reason to stop before then."

"I'm sorry, there's nothing we can do."  
Lyra laughed as the scientists, even the guards tried to back further into the corner.

"I can give you this green eco pack?" One of the younger scientists pleaded. "Maybe it'll help you."  
"Will it get me out of this lab?"  
"N..n...no"

"THEN WHAT GOOD IS IT?!"

She leapt forward, the young scientist screamed and threw the green eco towards her, whether in a desperate attempt at attack or appeasement Lyra wasn't sure. At the exact same moment a guard loosed a red eco slug from his rifle. Both contacted her skin at the same time. The sensation was...confusing. Lyra felt the overwhelming urge to both reason calmly and prove her strength, at this moment she wanted to be an indestructible force proving that she was not somebody to be messed with, and explaining why this could all be solved peacefully.  
"The computers, my files. Can you access them?"  
The scientists looked relieved at this more reasonable request, and that she'd stopped pulsing yellow eco.

"Yes, we can do that."  
"Good, download all of the data on me, this experiment, your language, maps, intelligence, culture."  
"The Commander would kill us if we gave you that!"

"You were talking about choices yesterday. Risk the commanders wrath later, or mine now, your choice."  
'_That was a horrible thing to say, why am I scaring these people?'_

Still, despite the nagging voice in her head her words had the desired effect. A disk she was assured contained all of the data she'd requested was placed in her hand moments later.

"Any currency you have too. Do you still have my things?"

"Yes."  
They all emptied their pockets, giving her what looked to be a small amount of currency between them and another scientist went to something resembling a vault, retrieving her boots and clothes and placing them in her backpack.  
"We stored them in stasis, we detected organic matter in the pack and we weren't sure what it was, so we decided to isolate it in case you were carrying contagions."

Looking at the chips in her hand, small things resembling a memory stick she looked back to the scientists.

It seemed now that the pulses of yellow had stopped a while the guards had regained some confidence. One strode up to her.

"None of this stuff matters, you'll never get out."

Brushing him aside with a sweep of her arm she suddenly realised how powerful her muscles felt when he flew several metres across the room. Grinning at the other two guards, she walked casually up to the security door and placed her hands against it.  
"She's going to try and push it open?" they laughed "That's over a metre thick!"

The laughter was interrupted by the sound of crunching metal as her fingers pushed into the door and scrunched together, making two handholds.  
"You were saying?" She shot a sarcastic smile at the open mouthed guards, before ripping her arms back and taking the door clean off the wall, throwing it to the side as she sized up the several guards that had been waiting on the other side of the door. She expected they would have usually attacked by now, but seeing a fairly short and slender girl rip a blast door off the wall clearly wasn't a turn of events they'd been prepared for.

"Hello boys"

Their stunned expressions only became more confused with her next words.  
"You know, I really don't want to hurt any of you. I appreciate you're guards, and I'm trying to escape, and it's your job to stop me. But guards keep the peace yes? I have committed no crime, I was experimented on against my will, now I wish to leave. Please, do what's right, just step aside and let me pass."

The Commander regained his composure first.  
"Attack!"

The guards charged forward.  
Lyra caught the first one in the ribs with a punch, he made a sickening crack as his armour buckled under her first and punctured into his chest.  
"Oh I'm so sorry! Hold still!"  
She bent down next to him, seemingly oblivious to the other guards punching and kicking her, ripped off his armour and shot green eco into his many wounds before offering him a hand to help him up._  
_She turned and began her attempts at reason again as she punched another guard in the face, deliberately holding back. She still knocked him out cold.  
"You know, we really don't need to be doing this."  
She pushed at a guard charging her and sighed as he slammed into the opposite side of the corridor with a grunt.

"I'm quite happy just to walk out without hurting anyone. Maybe I'll do a bit of structural damage on the way but nothing you can't repair."  
Another fell as she clapped her hands on either side of his head, turning casually, almost pleadingly to the next.

"Have you really considered what you're doing here? Surely it's not a satisfying job, torturing people, taking away their freedom for no good reason."

Three more guards went down.

"You should all really consider getting a different line of work, one that will go some way to atoning for what you've been doing in this lab."

The last of the guards went down, leaving only their yellow armoured Commander, who had apparently taken advantage of her fighting the others to grab the backpack she'd placed down. He picked up the weapon the first guard she'd hit had been carrying, it was different to the others. Pointing it at her he fired several bolts of blue eco from it, she suspected it was intended to stun her. It did nothing and he started running.

_'Wait, it is doing something.'_

Moments after it hit she felt a tingling sensation across her skin, like electricity. She would have suspected it was a delayed stun effect, except she felt energised. Looking around her she wondered how she hadn't realised how fun this had been, and started giggling hysterically. Looking up through her tears of laughter she noticed the Commanding running away from her, quite slowly, she tried to work out why he was going so slowly when it appeared he was in a sprint. This thought took a backseat however when she noticed he had her backpack.  
"Hey! That's mine! It's not nice to steal other peoples things you know!"

She gave chase, easily catching him. She grabbed her backpack and stood a few steps in front of him, starting to giggle again as he slowly skidded to a stop.

"How...how did you move so fast?"  
"Don't be silly, you were running so slow! You shouldn't start a game of chase if you're that slow!"

"This isn't a game freak!"  
He lunged at her with a punch, at least he looked like he did. Actually he once again confused Lyra by lunging in slow motion, she stepped neatly and easily to the side and once again entered a fit of giggles as he stumbled and fell flat onto his face.

"You're silly!"

He let out some kind of roar as several other guards approached from another end of the corridor. She watched the Commander slowly run forward to try and tackle her. She waited until he was close and then leap frogged over his back. A shock of blue eco went into him as her hands made contact with his armour and he went into spasm. Crinkling her nose in displeasure Lyra looked down at the still twitching Commander.  
"I think someone needs a change of pants!"  
She gleefully announced this to the approaching guards before bolting down another hallway yelling "Can't catch me!"

She laughed as she left the guards far behind, tearing through corridors until she reached a security door.  
"Hmmm"  
She shoved her palm against the keypad, her touch sending a jolt of blue eco into it that shorted out the circuits and caused the door to open.  
A full unit of guards were waiting on the other side.  
"Weeeee!"  
She'd backed up to the end of the corridor, charging forwards again and before she reached them started running on the side of the wall, reaching down and brushing as many as she could with her hand to give them all a jolt of blue eco and laugh at the surprised cries.

She shorted out a second security door with the remaining guards in close pursuit, feeling utter elation as she felt sunlight on her.


	5. Chapter 5

Jak was trying to contain a grin as he strolled back from the pumping station. It was still early in the morning and the streets were fairly empty, but he'd wanted to get the slums water back on before the heat of the day kicked in.  
"Why does this crap always happen to me?"  
Jak failed at containing a chuckle.  
"I don't know Dax, but it's damn funny."

"Really? It' funny is it? I'm soaked Jak! We'll see how funny it is when your shoulder starts to smell of wet fur..."  
Jak looked round at the annoyed Ottsel with a grin.  
"Dax, all you're doing is making a case for you walking."  
"Yeah, well...maybe I should walk! Your shoulder always ends up in dangerous places!"

"If it leaves with the rest of me, count it as a win. Besides, you needed a bath."  
Dax shot Jak a loathing look.

"You're drying me off when we get back to the Underground."

"You could always ask Tess..."  
Dax seemed to brighten at that.  
"Ahh yes, I can picture it now. Laying on a soft towel while she rubs me all over..."

Jak was just coming up with a smart comment to snap his friend out of what was clearly becoming an overly detailed fantasy when they heard gunfire coming from the fortress.

"Jak, we're not going to check it out."  
Jak grinned and started jogging towards the fortress, Dax sighed.

"Why can't we run AWAY from the gunfire like normal people for once?"

It only took Jak a few minutes to weave through the streets and reach the fortress entrance, he was ready for a lot of situations, but the one he faced wasn't one of them.

There were several unconscious guards and dozens more trying to catch a remarkably fast young woman wearing a backpack. A guard grabbed her arm and fell twitching onto the ground, another was chased down by the young woman and tapped on the back with the same result.

Dax was watching with his mouth wide enough for a flut-flut to fly in.  
"Is she playing tag with the KG?"

Jak had to admit, it did look like it.  
"I think she might be."  
"For once I'm glad I'm on your shoulder. What is she? Insane?!"

Jak grinned as he watched her charge a wall, back flip off of it and touch the two guards that had been chasing her on the neck when she landed behind them, treating them both to a jolt of blue eco that sent them to the floor.

"Admit it Dax, it looks fun, maybe she'll let me play?"

Dax slapped Jak round the head.

"I have a strict policy against suicidal crazy chicks. Though there is a definite appeal in the way she...bounces..."

"Dax!"

"What? I don't see you looking away!"

"She might need help."

"Yeah, that's why you're staring. Still weird though, didn't figure you for the type."

"If she wasn't in a...sort of fight...I'd be looking away."

"Yeah, sure Jak, do you say that at the bikini grease wrestling matches too?"

"The what?"

"Nothing, never mind, hey, LOOK! That girl can use blue eco!"

"Nice deflection Dax."

Jak noticed the young woman slowing down gradually, her shocks weren't knocking the guards out either, she must be running out. He started walking along the side of the street, positioning himself to help when she needed it.

…...

Lyra let off another shock, she held on for longer when she noticed they weren't having the hilarious result quite as quickly. Blue eco coursed into the guard and she went to giggle, before she could a thought struck her.

_'This isn't funny. Why would I find this amusing? They're trying to kill me.'_

The game she'd been revelling in came crashing down around her as she realised how stupid she was being. What on earth (or wherever she was) had made her find this fun, amusing, or anything other than a terrifying life threatening situation that had a best case scenario ending of her being dumped back into an eco tank?

She spun round and kicked out at a guards face when he got too close, cursing as her toes connected painfully with his metal helmet. She managed to catch his exposed jaw though, it clearly hurt enough for him to stagger back a few paces. They were all moving normally now, they weren't as slow as they had been. She wouldn't be able to keep this up for long.

Another grabbed her arm and she noted that he didn't get shocked, that lowered her chances even more – you get a lot easier to catch when physical contact no longer results in you electrocuting the other person.

She felt a sharp pain shoot up her leg and looked down to see it bleeding, it seemed she'd kept still for long enough to be shot. Her leg buckled while she looked at it, something that would be incredibly inconvenient to her escape shortly, but she was glad for it at this moment as she saw a shot fly through the air where her neck had been moments before.

She tried to crawl towards safety, she had no delusions that she actually stood a chance at escaping but she felt she had to try.

_'Why didn't I just run earlier? Why did playing blue eco tag seem like a good idea instead of escaping?'_

She could see a guard walking up behind her, she tried to crawl faster but knew it was mere seconds before he had her in his grasp. Or would have, had a man not seemingly appeared from nowhere and hit the guard with an incredibly painful looking uppercut.

Lyra amended the idea that the uppercut had been incredibly painful when the guard fell to the floor with a broken neck, it would have killed him instantly.

She turned slightly to get a better look at her saviour, he had green-blonde hair, a blue shirt and a spectacularly lean, muscular body that she could just make out through the shirt.

_'Really? I'm still very much in danger here and it's NOW my body decides to find a man attractive? I don't even remember the last time I looked at a guy and actually wanted to see more, and it happens now?!'_

She took the time he'd bought her to push herself onto her feet, managing a slow limp. She'd probably have been better of crawling.

_'Escape pretty much entirely depends on if he wins this or not. Might as well just watch.'_

She shuffled round in a small circle to watch him fight the five remaining guards, and for the first time since she'd been shot in the leg she felt hope. Her continued escape attempts before had just been morbid determination to die fighting.

He was quite skilled, if somewhat unrefined in his fighting technique. His punches were powerful, his uppercut had literally proved fatal and the wild spin kicks he threw were poorly aimed but more than made up for it in strength. She stopped observing his technique just before he grabbed the final guard by the head and twisted sharply, snapping his neck.

Lyra felt her hormones take another uncharacteristic surge as he turned to her and sauntered over with a sexy grin.

_'Is the saunter and sexy grin intentional or just the way he acts?'_

Before she devoted any more time to this question, her thoughts were interrupted as she noticed what appeared to be an orange meerkat on his shoulder. It was wearing a little leather hat and smiling.

"I'm Jak, you ok?"

"Yes, I'm fine, thank you for your help."

Her leg disagreed and buckled again as she went to shake the hand he'd offered. She cursed as he caught her, he'd better not mistake this for swooning. This had not been a case of swooning. She'd been shot. That was all. Lyra HAD NOT just swooned.

"You sure? You look like you could use a hand."

"Yeah sweet cheeks, you don't look like you're in a position to turn down help."  
Lyra looked up and blinked.

"Did he just talk or have I taken a blow to the head?"

Jak chuckled, clearly this was a common question.

"Yeah, I'm sure he'll tell you all about it later. Right now, have you got a blanket in your backpack?"

"Probably, why?"

"You're naked."

_'SHIT.'_

"So I am, there are clothes in the backpack."

Jak raised an eyebrow.

"Then why didn't you put them on?"

"Not that we're complaining toots."

"I um...forgot?"

"Riiight"

Jak reached into her backpack and pulled out a blanket. When Lyra gave him a questioning look he shrugged and said.

"Figured we should get out of here as soon as possible, do proper clothes when we're hidden."

"Good point. I didn't think of that."

"You forgot to get dressed, I wasn't expecting you to."

_'Fantastic, a truly spectacular first impression.'_

It took her a moment to notice his mocking grin as he draped the blanket over her shoulders.

She wrapped it around herself with one arm and leaned on him with the other before she started limping away from the fortress.

"I want to actually escape today, so how about I carry you this time?"

_'That is not romantic, it's practical. Stop thinking of it as romantic. Damn you hormones! He's just seen you naked, focus on the humiliated part!'_

Her hormones complied, causing her to blush heavily as he scooped her up. He noticed and smirked.

"I'm not blushing because you're handsome."

He smirked more.

_'You just called him handsome!'_

"So you think I'm handsome do you? I can't say I'm surprised, all the ladies do."

_'Now the talking orange meerkat thinks I fancy him.'_

"No I meant Jak."

_'You admitted you think he's handsome! AGAIN!'_

"Just drop me please..."


	6. Chapter 6

Jak jogged into the Underground hideout carrying the young woman, she'd been losing blood quickly on the way back and had passed out a couple of minutes ago.

"Torn! Tess! We're gonna need some green eco!"

Tess appeared from one of the hallways and instantly sprinted back down it, yelling on the way.  
"Bring her into my room. I've got a few packs."

He carried her into the room, finding Tess sweeping files off her bed and onto the floor with her foot while she rummaged through a cupboard, emerging victorious soon after with a small green eco pack.

"Put her on the bed."

Tess looked at the young woman's ankle and cringed.

"Ouch, that's nearly gone down to the bone. I'm not sure we've got enough green eco to fix it, but it should keep her alive until we get more. Dax, go to the main room and get the rest from the supply cupboard while we start putting this on?"

"Sure thing."

Dax scurried off as Tess broke open the eco pack and started rubbing it into the exposed muscle.

"Huh, that's odd."

Jak realised what Tess meant as he saw the eco absorb into the young woman's skin, re-appearing in green sparks that began to heal the tissue.

"Oh, right, when we first saw her she was channelling blue eco. Guess she can use green too?"

"Must be able to. The rate she's healing with it that might be enough."

"That pack? It was tiny, cuts and scrapes."

"I know but, well, look."

Jak looked back to the ankle, the skin was already reforming around it, the muscle looked completely healed. He smiled slightly as he heard a series of crashes in the other room.

"Word of advice Torn. Label your shit! Where's the damned green eco?"

"I'll go tell Dax he can stop tearing the hideout apart. Call me when she wakes up?"

Lyra awoke a few hours later to a strange sensation. Relative comfort. She listened carefully for a few minutes and hearing nothing, opened her eyes cautiously to glance around. She was on a bed, it wasn't a particularly comfortable bed but equally it wasn't a metal table. She was clothed, that was odd.

_'Oh God, I can't believe I did that!'  
_The memory of why clothing was odd rushed back. She'd been naked in the street, which meant someone had dressed her. For some reason she felt a slight bruise to her ego at this.

_'A handsome man carries me off and while I'm passed out he puts clothes ON me?'_

It was a ridiculous thought and she knew it. She'd have been annoyed if she hadn't woken up covered. Not to mention the many, many things that should take priority in questioning this situation above why she hadn't been rescued by a heroic pervert. Plus, she'd never been under any illusions about her body, she was an attractive young woman. Well...she had been, there hadn't been much time to check the results of thirty days of torture on her physical appearance. She looked down briefly, scanning her body and exposed skin.

_'Skin not scarred, check. Curves in all the right places, check. Gymnast muscle tone...'_

Clearly the time convulsing in pain hadn't counted as proper exercise. Her once slender muscled frame was now just bordering on dangerously thin. That was ten years of a ritualistic daily exercise routine down the drain, still, she was fairly sure she could get back to where she'd been within a month.

_'...Partly check. Slightly small but perky breasts, check.'_

Well, unless something terrible had happened to her face, which seemed unlikely given the immaculate condition of the rest of her skin, she could still rely on men to annoy her every time she went anywhere near a bar. Aside from being annoyed by men who didn't understand the idea of a woman leaving isolation for anything but a one night stand, this came as a surprising relief.

_'Hmm, I guess I'm more shallow than I thought. Ah well, if you're going to show your breasts to the world, they may as well be perky.'_

She smiled slightly at the thought. A man had once opened with the 'perky breasts' line, earning him a scalding look and a brutally efficient rejection, but her friends had constantly teased her about it ever since. Now she couldn't look at her cleavage without thinking of the word 'perky' and smiling. Of the many strange quirks her brain had, it was one of her least favourite and yet among the most comforting.

She let out a slight start as she tilted her head to the side and noticed a figure sat in the corner of the room. It was barely noticeable, only making the tiniest of sounds as the bed shifted minutely with her back tensing, but he heard it and his head shot up, quickly followed by him standing and walking over.

"You ok?"

"Fine, thank you, where am I?"

"Underground base."

She gave him a blank look that seemed to annoy him slightly, he rolled his eyes as he realised he was going to have to explain further.

"It's a resistance movement against the Baron and the KG. You were shot, remember?"

"Yes, there's nothing wrong with my memory. I'm just...not from here, I have no idea where I am or what's going on."

His expression seemed to soften slightly for a moment, but before Lyra could confirm it existed it was gone, replaced once again by mild annoyance.

"You're Jak right?"

"Yeah. You never said your name."

"Lyra."

"Well Lyra, glad you're ok."

He turned to leave.

"Wait, you waited by my bedside so you could just leave as soon as I woke up?"

He looked back, clearly getting increasingly annoyed by her refusal to give him a brief nod and then sit in silence.

_'Oh joy, I've been rescued by a brooder. That's just what I need, the first person I meet who isn't intent on torturing me with chemicals is going to torture me with brooding.'_

"There weren't any missions, nothing better to do so I figured I'd keep an eye on you. You're not dead, I've got better things to do than babysit."

"Weren't you here in the first place because you _haven't_ got better things to do?"

He shot her another annoyed look, clearly regretting engaging her in conversation at all, before offering a defeated shrug and sitting down again.  
"You know about the Baron, KG, Metal Heads?"

"No, I'm also unclear on whether or not I dreamed the talking animal, since he doesn't seem to be here."

"Oh Dax? He's off with Tess. I guess I could explain how things are here."

* * *

**Authors note.**

****So there we have my first update. Not the most interesting of chapters I'm afraid. Coming up soon is a more...stable demonstration of Lyra's powers, and an explanation on why her personality is all over the place. I see mischief and mayhem approaching...

On a slightly less story related note, thank you so much for your views, reviews and follows. It really means a lot.

Final note, Jak at this stage is proving quite fun to write. I usually hate trying to write abrupt, grouchy characters.


	7. Chapter 7

Lyra couldn't believe what she was hearing. Though she suspected the parts she couldn't believe weren't exactly the parts everyone else would have fixated on. A tyrannical usurper ruling with an iron fist, propaganda and increasing numbers of laws designed to crush the joy and hope out of the souls of his subjects? This ruler being supported by drafted citizens who inexplicably obeyed sadistic orders instead of overthrowing him? Those bits were entirely believable to Lyra. It happened all the time. What surprised her was that they were under attack by creatures who had somehow evolved to include metal in their natural make-up. She was just as shocked to learn about the Precursors and how eco seemed to be a natural part of this places environment, though she stopped prying when her ignorance of these clearly basic facts of life made Jak look increasingly like he might start demanding answers on how she didn't know this. Lyra suspected that the only reason he hadn't so far was that his apathy towards her outweighed his confusion, and seeming annoyance, that she didn't know any of this.

_'Clearly the saving grace in this situation is that curiosity would cut further into his time of sitting alone looking angry, and we couldn't have that.'_

She mentally scolded herself for this thought. He might not be the picture of cheer and helpfulness but he had saved her life and he was explaining things for her.

He was looking particularly...something...while he explained the Baron though. Lyra suspected it was personal.

"Are you ok Jak? You look like there's something you need to talk about."

There was another flash of expression, surprise perhaps, before his face set back into annoyance.

"I'm fine."

"Are you sure?"

"Drop it."

He turned and left the room, not noticing the middle finger Lyra was giving his back.

_'Great, broody AND moody. This is going to be good.'_

She sat there doing a bit of brooding herself. Clenching and unclenching her fist as she wondered if all of the Underground were like this. A welcome answer to this question came in the form of a young blonde woman popping her head round the side of the doorway.

"Hey sweetie, you feeling better?"

"A little shocked, but yes, thank you."

"Good, I'm Tess."

"Lyra."

Tess had walked in and sat next to her on the bed, carefully placing her hand on Lyra's arm, as if she wasn't certain touching her wouldn't result in a violent mood swing.

"Jak said he found you outside the fortress?"

"He probably did then. I'm afraid I don't know the area that well."

"You from the docks then? Industrial?"

"Um, no, I'm not from here. Jak said it's just this city?"

Clearly Lyra was setting off alarms, the blonde gave her a suspicious look. It was a stark contrast from the warm, concerned smile of a moment before.

"Where are you from, Lyra?"

There was no lie convincing enough without knowing this world better, no way to deflect the question. Of course she knew enough about manipulation to make a valiant attempt at lying, but she suspected Tess wouldn't fall for it, and that trying might not be a good idea.

"Promise not to tell anyone else?"

"As long as I don't need to."

It was a reasonable answer, and better than she'd expected. Lyra took a deep breath, time to give the insane truth a try.

"Please don't think I'm mad. I think I might be from another planet. There was a temple there, I think it was built by whatever you call the precursors, there was an...accident and the next thing I knew I was in the fortress."

Tess seemed to take this extremely well, considering what she'd just been told.

"Can everyone on your world manipulate eco like you do?"

"My world doesn't even have eco. I can only assume that's why I reacted differently to it."

Tess raised an eyebrow.

"Differently to who?"

Lyra reached into her backpack and rummaged around, pulling out the chip containing the information on her from the KG.

"This explains everything that's happened to me since I got here in detail, I'm told. Is it possible for you to make me a copy of the maps and other things on it? I need to learn my way around this world."

There was the suspicion again.

"They gave you this?"

"I'd just been radiating yellow eco at the time, I gave them the option between giving me the information and burning. I'd stopped and I have no idea how I could start again, but they didn't know that."

A visible smirk went over Tess's face at this.

"Oh, I think we're gonna get on! I need to go and start looking through this."

"Of course, it was nice meeting you Tess."

"Likewise Lyra."

As she exited the room Tess stopped suddenly and turned around.

"Lyra, mind if I ask you one more thing?"

"Would it happen to be why I'm being so open about something most people would hide?"

The smirk showed again.

"That's the one."

Lyra shrugged slightly, she'd been half wondering this herself.

"I don't know where I am, I have a limited understanding of what's been done to me, I don't know how to read your writing, how to blend in, how to get around the city, the KG are probably looking for me. You're the first people I've met who haven't tried to hurt or kill me, Jak says you're fighting the KG, who want me captured or killed. If I have to throw my lot in with someone, which I suspect I do, you seem to be the best choice. Besides, by the time you finish with the information that should be on that chip you'll know more about my time here than I do, and I expect you'll understand more. You might be able to explain it."

Tess nodded with a smile and walked off. A door on the other side of the hall opened shortly after she was gone and a tattooed man walked into the room.

"Smart answer, you might just make it. I'm Torn, follow me."


	8. Chapter 8

The man didn't so much have an aura of authority as he blasted it around himself, he was clearly in charge here. Lyra thought he didn't seem the type of person you wanted to make repeat themselves, so she stood up and followed as he walked off.

"Wait here"

Torn shut her in a small room and disappeared down the hall, when he came back he was carrying four packs of eco, one red, one blue, one green and one yellow. He motioned to Lyra, handing her the green pack.

"I want you to show me how you use these things."

Lyra hesitated slightly.

"Not very well, the first time I used them was today and I didn't seem to have much control."

She regretted mentioning this, he did not look impressed.

"Try."

Breaking open the pack of green eco she watched it sink into her skin as she touched it, letting out a slight yelp when the nasty looking curved blade across Torn's back nicked the palm of her hand shortly after, and with no warning. It occurred to her briefly that if it wasn't for the wonderfully calm, passive feeling the green eco had just caused she'd have probably punched him in the face.

Torn nodded in interest as the sparks of green eco danced across the cut, pulling the skin with them and then sinking in to heal it in moments. The only trace that there had ever been a cut was the single drop of blood.

"You cut me!"

"You're fine. Hey, you!"

A battered and bruised looking underground member turned as Torn addressed him.

"Yes Sir?"

"We've got a girl here that can use green eco, want to see if she can heal up those bruises?"

"Is it uh...safe Sir?"

"That's what we're going to find out. I won't make you do it James."

James looked slightly nervous, but his face set in determination, clearly wanting to impress Torn.

"I'll do it Sir."

Torn turned to Lyra and gestured over at James.

"Try healing him. Carefully."

Lyra obliged, placing her hand gently on his bruised face and focusing, trying to push the green eco to the injury. To her surprise, she could feel it in her body now she was looking for it. To even greater surprise, the eco responded to her will and shot down her fingers and onto the bruises. When she took her hand away there was no trace the bruise had ever been there and James sighed in relief before addressing her.

"Thank you, I can't tell you how good it feel to have that gone."

Before Lyra could respond Torn cut in harshly.

"Don't you have a mission to prepare for James?"

"Yes sir."

James scurried off to another part of the base and Torn turned to Lyra again, nodding in clear approval.

"Well, if nothing else you'll be useful as a medic. Try red."

Once again, Lyra obliged, keen to discover how the rest of it would work.

When the red eco absorbed into her system she felt confident, strong and a desire to prove it.

"Fight me."

Torn clearly wasn't expecting that.

"What?"

"Fight me, I want to beat you, I want to win something."

"Why?"

"I don't know, must be the red eco. I'll settle for a race."

Torn just stared at her, his face a mixture of disbelief and annoyance until a few minutes later the effect wore off and Lyra stopped challenging him to contests. She shook her head slightly.

"That was weird."

"What happened to you?"

"I guess it must be the eco. When I touched green I felt really calm, passive. But with red I felt really strong and competitive. I wonder what the other two will do?"

Torn shifted on his feet, clearly slightly uncomfortable with the thought. Green was for healing and red was often used to strengthen things, the results in her personality with those had matched up to some degree. Yellow eco was volatile, dangerous, potentially destructive, blue chaotic, energetic and unpredictable. From what Jak had described when this girl had been using blue eco she wasn't fighting the KG, she was playing a game with them, acting on what was seemingly playful desires with no regard for safety or consequence. The reaction he'd just seen to red had been dangerous enough in the wrong situation. The next two might need some backup. He motioned for Lyra to wait and leaned into the hall.

"Jak, Tess. Get in here!"

Jak strolled out from his quarters down the hall, while Tess came sprinting from the main section of the base, clearly looking worried.

"What's wrong Torn? Is she ok?"

"She's fine Tess."

Maybe he should have been more specific that nothing was wrong, Tess looked annoyed.

"You worried me!"

"Just...I might need some backup when she interacts with the next two eco's."

Jak decided to show a mild interest at this point.

"Why?"

"As well as gaining abilities from them, she's reacting emotionally with contact. It's matching up with the eco. Green made her tranquil, red made her overconfident and competitive. You said blue seemed to give her a chaotic nature with no regard for consequence?"

"Well she was playing tag with the KG, naked."

Lyra blushed.

_'We don't need to keep pointing that out, Jak.'_

"Well I might need some help controlling her with the blue, but I think I'm definitely going to need backup for yellow."

They both nodded in understanding. Lyra was suddenly feeling very nervous as they handed her the pack of blue eco.

"Do I have to do this Torn?"

"Yes."

His tone was not one she felt confident enough to argue with any more, so she tore open the pack and let her skin absorb it.

"How do you feel?"

She looked up with a mischievous grin.

"Bored!"

She'd barely blurted out the answer before she was swinging from the light fixture.

"Get down from there!"

When Torn's authoritative tone did little more than make Lyra giggle and swing from it more gleefully, Jak stepped over to grab her legs.

"Ah! SHIT!"

He let go quickly as a shock ran through him.

"Ooh, that was pretty."

Lyra let go of the light fixture and clapped her hands as she landed, sending a shower of blue sparks up from them.

"Look at what I can do!"

She clapped her hands again. Torn stepped forward with a stern expression and Tess sighed pulling him back.

"I don't think telling her off is going to help, do you? Let me try."

Stepping forward Tess giggled and pointed in awe at the sparks Lyra was still creating with frantic claps of her hands.

"They're so pretty! Can you keep making them for me?"

Lyra beamed with pride that someone else appreciated just how fantastic the sparks were.

"Sure!"

She started clapping her hands even faster, creating a large and constant shower of sparks around them. It didn't take long before Tess's plan worked and she expended all the blue eco creating the little light show, looking down at her hands in annoyance.

"Ugh, that's an annoying one."

Jak was still rubbing his hands, the skin on both red and cracked from the shock she'd given him.

"You're telling me."

"Oh I'm sorry, I didn't mean to, here, let me try something."

Lyra stepped towards him, taking his hands in hers and sending the small amount of green eco she still felt running through her system to him. She started feeling ill, and Jak looked even more annoyed.

"Stop leeching me."

"What?"

She stumbled backwards as a pain shot through her hands. Torn caught her and Tess ran over.

"Sweetie, are you ok?"

Tess turned accusingly towards Jak.

"What did you do to her Jak?"

Lyra got another angry glance when he was blamed for what was happening to her.

"Nothing, she's the one that just started taking my dark eco."

He actually seemed quite annoyed about that.

"Well it's not like you wanted it."

"That's not the point, she should have asked!"

Lyra's eyes rolled back up into her head and Tess turned on Jak, snapping.

"She absorbs on contact! I doubt she even knew what she was doing! Go and get her a green eco pack."

When Jak poured the green eco onto her and her skin absorbed it she started to feel better, but her body wasn't happy. Whatever was making her ill was still there, the green eco was just counteracting it's effects.

"Jak, help her!"

"What am I meant to do?"

"Take it back!"

"If I touch her she's probably just gonna leech more from me."

Tess frowned, he was probably right. Jak stepped forward, he seemed to have an idea.

"Lyra, focus on it, try and expel it."

"That's the dumbest thing I ever heard, then we'll have dark eco in the base!"

"I'll absorb it Torn."

"Oh, right. Fine then."

Jak held his hands under hers.

"Can you feel the dark eco?"

"Yes, I can safely say I feel the stuff that's trying to destroy me from the inside."

"Hey, you leeched it off me, I'm just trying to help. Try and send it out of your fingers."

"What makes you think I can control it?"

Jak shrugged.

"You seem to be able to control green, you can probably do it with any eco."

"Fine."

Lyra wasn't entirely sure why she was so angry with him. It had been an accident, and he was trying to help. But something about the way he refused to crawl under a rock and die for making her feel ill was incredibly aggravating right now. Still, nobody else had any better ideas so she started collecting the dark eco that had spread through her body and sending it to her fingertips. She was actually annoyed when she felt it working. Drop by drop the dark eco fell from her fingers and into Jak's open hands, sparking slightly as it went into his skin.

"I think that one made me...angry?"

Jak shrugged again.

"Yeah, it does that."

"Is at all gone sweetie?"

"Yes, thank you Tess, I'm fine. The green eco's fixed all of the damage it did. Why doesn't it hurt Jak like that?"

A series of awkward glances were exchanged and Jak glared at her again briefly, making Lyra decide against pushing for an answer. The awkward silence continued until Tess decided she couldn't stand it any longer.

"Time for a break I think, food anyone?"

* * *

**A/N: **So there we have the next two chapters, reviews welcome as always. Sorry for the gap between them, this particular stage is proving difficult to write and I haven't had much time to give it the required attention. Hopefully I've started to clear up a few questions on Lyra's rapidly shifting personality and power levels, stay tuned for further answers, followed by even more questions!

Thanks again to my lovely Beta's and readers, and once again, I don't own Jak and Daxter, if I did I'd be too busy doing the happy dance to write.


	9. Chapter 9

Everyone nodded in agreement to the suggestion of food and Lyra followed the others to a small kitchen with a table and some chairs in the corner. There were only two chairs so Lyra followed Torn over to help with the food and try to prevent the argument he was having with Tess escalating.

"Get out of the way Tess, I'm trying to make something."

"Oh no Torn, I've tasted your food."

"There's nothing wrong with my food."

Daxter walked along the counter and poked Torn in the stomach.

"Buddy, the things you make with food are a crime against nature."

Dax jumped behind Lyra as Torn raised a saucepan threateningly.

"Rodents out of my kitchen!"

"He's not Vermin! I think he's adorable!"

Tess objected as she gently guided Dax back towards the safety of Jak's shoulder.

Tess eventually won the argument on who got to cook and shortly after presented everyone at the table with a bowl of stew. Lyra looked at it with some concern as she sat down, Jak, to her surprise, had offered her his seat. The show of chivalry had been somewhat ruined in Lyra's eyes by the way he had just tipped his bowl to his mouth.

_'I think there are at least five different vegetables in this, any one could be dangerous to me...but I need to eat.'_

Tess noticed Lyra's apprehensive glance at the bowl.

"It's nothing fancy and there's no meat, meat's a bit of a luxury around here, but it tastes great and it'll keep you going."

Lyra rushed an apology when she realised the concerned look would likely be taken as a reflection on Tess's cooking.

"Oh, no Tess, it's not that, it smells wonderful. It's just we don't have any of these ingredients where I'm from and I'm worried that...well.."

"Oh, you're worried you might react differently to the food here than us."

Torn shared a look of understanding with Tess when Lyra nodded nervously, having overheard the conversation earlier, but Jak and Daxter seemed slightly confused by this comment. It was Daxter that couldn't contain his curiosity.

"Why would you react differently? Where are you from anyway?"

Lyra was looking helplessly between Torn and Tess, hoping for one of them to come up with something convincing for her, but neither seemed to be able to think of anything. For the second time that day, Jak turned out to be her saviour.

"Leave her alone Dax, she doesn't want to talk."

When Lyra gave him a grateful smile he just shrugged back at her. Right as she once again gave up on any real friendly gesture from the man he finished greedily drinking his stew and went to say something, giving her a bit of hope that he wasn't as bad as she first thought.

"So, you gonna eat that?"

_'Or maybe he is that bad. Why is it always the handsome ones that have such a sharp intellect?'_

This time she shrugged at him and carefully tasted the stew.

Satisfied that nothing in the taste indicated that she shouldn't be eating it and suddenly understanding Jak's appetite as her stomach kicked in with a vengeance at the prospect of food, she picked up the bowl and began drinking it greedily, ignoring the surprised gazes from everyone else at the table.

_'If only Mother could see me now, she wouldn't know where to start correcting my manners.'_

The thought was followed by an embarrassed mental apology for her earlier judgement on Jak's eating habits.

Once again, it was Dax who commented first.

"They not feed you toots?"

"Not enough. I guess with a food shortage test subjects weren't a priority."

That seemed to get Jak's attention and Lyra was mentally scolding herself for making such a revealing comment.

"What were you a test subject for?"

His question had an almost harsh, suspicious tone to it, but there was a slight underlying note of worry and sympathy.

Lyra gave a brief glance at Tess again, who nodded to let her know that she could trust Jak.

"My body reacts differently to eco, when it's exposed to it my cells mutate over time and I gain the ability to store it. So they kept me there and exposed me to eco until I could store more."

Jak just nodded, looking almost annoyed again as they finished off their meal. An awkward silence reigned while they cleaned up before Torn started to walk out, turning and gesturing to them when nobody followed.

"Time to test Yellow."

A yellow eco pack was opened and handed to Lyra, who cringed slightly as she poured it onto her skin, expecting it to burn like before. She finished pouring the pack on quickly when it didn't even sting, relieved that she wasn't going to have to feel that pain again.

"How do you feel sweetie?"

Lyra looked up at Tess, but found her eyes quickly shift to Torn. He was quite attractive in a particular way, but Lyra decided not really her type. Her gaze shifted to Jak. Now there was a body she wanted to...

_'Whoa, different thoughts! Kittens, flowers, terrible car crashes, kittens in terrible car crashes...muscular arms, a toned chest, sexy scowling, come-to-bed eyes...No. My skin dissolving, unbearable torture, being shot, Metal Heads, the image of those was pretty terrifying, thunderstorms. It rains a lot in thunderstorms, I wonder what he'd look like soaked in water...or in the shower, all toned and glistening with water running over his muscles...'_

"Uh, Lyra, you still there?"

_'God he has a sexy voice...'_

"Sure, you wanted to know how I feel?"

He entirely missed the mischief in her voice.

"Well Torn and Tess did, I'm just here to stop you causing trouble."

"Ok then."

She flew across the room, grabbing Jak's head and pulling him into a rough, passionate kiss before throwing her legs around his waist.

_'He even looks sexy when he looks surprised. If you think this is surprising Jak, just wait...'_

She didn't even notice Tess and Torn staring open mouthed. Later on she wasn't even certain if she still knew they were in the room, just that at that point she probably wouldn't have cared.

A full awkward minute passed with Jak held in place and Torn and Tess unable to do anything but stare in shock before Lyra came up for air.

"Get her off of me!"

Lyra dropped her legs back to the floor and took a couple of steps back, feigning hurt with a coy smile.

"You didn't enjoy it?"

Jak just stared at her, his face still a mixture of shock and anger. Eventually he managed to say something.

"What the fuck was that about?!"

She looked back, a sultry smile on her lips and replied with seduction in her voice.

"You don't know how it works? That's ok, I'll tell you and then we can practice, and practice, and practice..."

"I know how it works!"

"Even better, more time to master the practical side if you already know the theory."

Jak found himself looking helplessly between Torn and Tess, settling on Torn when Tess looked somewhat amused by the situation.

"Torn, tell her!"

"Uh, right...Lyra, I wanted to know how you felt, not for you to do...that."

"Oh don't worry Torn, that was all about what I wanted. Though it was a good demonstration of how I felt, I can also tell you _what_ I felt when I wrapped my legs around him if you'd like."

Torn and Jak both shot Tess an angry glance when she started laughing.

"It's not funny Tess! I didn't want her to do that!"

"From what I felt you didn't want me to stop either..."

Jak walked out without another word, Tess nearly fell over with laughter.

"TESS!"

The laughter stopped abruptly when Torn snapped at her.

"Yes Torn?"

"Are you done?"

"Yes, sorry."

Torn ignored that she was still grinning, clearly holding in another giggle.

"Good. Lyra, we wanted to see what you can do with the yellow eco."

"Oh, well why didn't you say that before?"

Lyra held out her hand and a sphere of condensed yellow eco formed hovering over her palm.

"Got a target?"

"Hold on."

Torn went to the room across the hall and came back with what appeared to be a dress making dummy with a target painted on its chest. Before he'd put it down, Lyra fired the sphere of yellow eco towards it.

Torn looked furious as it approached, and relieved when it went far wide of its target.

"You don't EVER shoot at a target until everyone's clear!"

"You do in battle."

"DOES THIS LOOK LIKE BATTLE?"

"No, it looks like a creepy dress shop distinctly lacking a green haired hottie."

"Maybe if you got your head off of those thoughts you wouldn't miss."

"I didn't miss."

"What are you talking about, you fired ages ago and it was way off!"

"Look behind you Torn."

He turned to see the sphere of yellow eco floating behind him, occasionally darting from side to side. It made a mock charge at him before backing off again.

"Now, are you going to get clear so I can actually shoot the target?"

"Don't push it rookie."

He stepped clear and the sphere immediately circled the dummy before crashing into the centre of the target and burning straight through.

"I'd like to see you pull that shot off."

"Still a rookie."

"Oh, how about this then?"

Lyra stepped closer to the dummy and held out her hand, firing a jet of yellow eco that engulfed the top half of the dummy and starting dissolving it. She'd nearly gotten the whole way through when the eco ran out.

"Felling better?"

"Oh god...oh god no..."

"How did you feel?"

"Passionate, fiery and impulsive and...oh no..."

Tess started giggling again.

"Regretting the kiss?"

"I have to go and apologise! Where is he?"

"Probably in the training room, down the hall. Listen for the sound of things smashing."

* * *

**A/N**

So another chapter is up, and as always I hope you enjoyed it. I know updates haven't been as regular as I'd like, so I promise the next chapter will come sooner and be longer, just as a 'thanks' for sticking with me. I'll openly admit, I was stuck with a terrible block at this point - My Muse ran away to Misty Island and Jak was too busy having his face attacked by a randy, yellow eco charged young lady to go and get the bugger for me.  
Fortunately, my Muse returned a few days ago of it's own accord and Lyra detached herself from Jak's face. So on with the story!

As always, thanks for reading, reviews are appreciated and I don't own Jak and Daxter.


	10. Chapter 10

Jak was in the process of tearing into a training dummy when he heard her creep in. Judging by the silence she was either nervous or just watching him. He gave her a minute to say something before he got tired of waiting and turned round to face her, letting her know in no uncertain terms that she wasn't welcome.

"Get out."

"Jak! When a woman treats you like that you at least talk to her after" Dax said with an admonishing look, that quickly twisted into humour " usually make her breakfast too."

"It's not funny Dax."

"Fine, just saying...you wouldn't hear me complaining."

Lyra was still just standing there staring awkwardly, it was getting increasingly annoying.

"Say what you wanted to say and then leave."

"I'm really sorry, I'd never normally...do that."

"Sure. That all?"

"We could fight if it makes you feel better?"

She gave him a sad, hopeful smile as she offered the violent peace gesture.

Jak shrugged as he looked over her skinny frame, clearly not impressed with her chances.

"I don't want to hurt you...that badly."

He'd been trying to accept her apology and get rid of her as quickly as possible, but somehow she looked slightly offended that he didn't want to punch her in the face.

"I practised with my brother all of the time. I know what I'm getting into."

Jak recognised that tone. It was one of wounded pride. Wounded pride he had better things to do than nurse.

"Doubt it."

"Do you want an excuse to hit me or not?"

He couldn't deny, THAT was a good point. If she was so desperate to be beaten up over it, who was he to deny them both the pleasure?

"You're on."

A few minutes later Jak stood in victory. He decided it hadn't been a bad fight all in all, and that punch to her gut had certainly helped him on the road to forgive her. She turned briefly as she walked off.

"I really am sorry Jak."

"Go get some green eco for your nose."

She nodded with a slight smile and it surprised him that she realised that was as close to him saying that it was all right as she was going to get, and didn't mind. She almost looked like she preferred it that way.

Dax followed as she left the room, bounding along the dimly lit hallway beside her.

"Hey, Lyra, wait up!"

She paused briefly to talk to him, but she just couldn't manage it. He was so much shorter that trying to keep eye contact was making her neck hurt. It didn't help that the angle he had to look up at made it look like he was staring at her chest instead of her face, though she wouldn't have been surprised if he was. For a different species he seemed to have an interest in women that was far above healthy.

"Perhaps we could talk somewhere else Dax? The kitchen maybe?"

He nodded and shortly after they found themselves at far more comfortable angles, Lyra sat on a chair while Dax stood on the table in front of her.

"What did you want to talk about Dax?"

She had to admit, she was curious enough that the green eco could wait, even though it meant she had to pinch her nose to slow the bleeding.

"I...well...there's no easy way to say this sweetcheeks..."

Lyra suspected this hesitancy was rather uncharacteristic for the loud little creature, which only piqued her interest further. He seemed like the kind of guy...animal...that appreciated a slightly suggestive joke, and she was still in a hurry to fix her nose so it made sense to set him at ease.

"What is it Dax? You're madly in love with me and want us to run away and start a furry family in the countryside? It happen all the time, don't worry about it. Though it would be unfair not to tell you, I'm not going to wear a ring in front of the boys."

Dax let out an approving cackle, and as she suspected, relaxed considerably before replying.

"You won't trap me that easily sweetcheeks, I'm not a one woman kind of guy you know. But seriously...it's about Jak. Don't take it personally, he has his own...issues."

The way he said issues implied there was something very interesting to know here.

She replied as casually as she could. "What kind of issues?"

He smirked at her efforts to pretend she hadn't caught the hint that these weren't the standard issues.

"You're good sweetcheeks. But I'm better."

Now there was a challenge if she'd ever heard one.

"Dax, one day I'll take that challenge. But for now, what kind of issues?"

"Jak got tortured with Dark eco and now a rabid, psychopathic creature lives in his head and can take over his body. He goes all pale and and has fangs and talons and horns."

Dax blurted it out, his voice getting progressively higher and faster as he went. Lyra was sure that wasn't the correct way to tell someone something like that. She wasn't sure if there was a right way to tell someone that, but she knew Dax's method hadn't been it.

"Oh"

She was rather surprised that was all she managed considering the urge to run around screaming like a little girl. This was one more boulder in the landslide of recent reality shifting revelations that she just didn't need at the moment.

_'Think Lyra, clever, useful questions. Don't freak out.'_

"Can this creature come out at any time?"

Dax shook his head.

"Only when my boy has a lot of dark eco in his system. And then only when he's too pissed off to control it."

That was oddly comforting. She made a mental note to ask about his eco levels before she made him angry.

"He can control it?"

Dax shook his head again. That wasn't the response she'd been hoping for.

"He can usually stop it taking control, but if he's angry it can push it's way out, and more dark eco the harder it gets for him to contain."

Well that actually did explain a lot.

"Thank you Dax, I appreciate knowing that."

Daxter nodded and started to leave the room, muttering something about finding Jak.

Green eco was proving to be a miracle. It had saved her life and now when she looked into the mirror as the green sparks snapped her broken nose back into place she considered the interesting effects it could have on the society here. She'd only been free in this world for a day and already her first thought when she heard the crunch as Jak's fist caught her face had been that green eco would heal it, she had to wonder if the nonchalance she was rapidly developing towards being injured was felt among the people of Haven as a whole, or if she was simply reacting to the discovery this way because such perfect healing was new to her. Did everyone find the prospect of injury less intimidating with the knowledge that green eco could heal it? Jak certainly hadn't felt the need to show any restraint, she'd have to remember next time that there was no need to worry about hurting him – while she suspected they were at best evenly matched, and that he could likely still beat her, that he had grown up without concern for causing such injuries was an advantage he certainly didn't need. With any luck her comparative restraint this time would make her lack of it all the more surprising next time.

She headed to the central room of the base that seemed to be used for planning and assigning missions and found herself stood next to Jak in the doorway, neither of them wanting to intrude on the argument Torn was having with a fairly intimidating looking man.

"You know what happens to people who disappoint Krew, you really want to be late with his payment again?"

"Back off Carl."

Torn stared the man straight in the eyes as he fronted up to him, Carl was staring straight back with an unpleasant smile curling over his lips. Lyra and Jak looked at each other. There was no doubt how this was going to end.

Lyra 's brain whirred into action as she sized up the man Torn had called Carl. He was average looking, tall, muscular and wearing a shirt with the sleeves ripped off. He was clearly hired muscle, it seemed he'd been sent to remind Torn of an impending debt. No gun, that was a good sign, he was there to intimidate and not expected to carry out any threats he delivered. His muscular frame was clearly on show, from the way the sleeves of his shirt had been ripped off to show his biceps it was as much to impress as intimidate. His frame would have been more than enough to scare clients. The muscles were on show to catch the attention of women...hopefully women, if not she might need to enlist Jak's help.

Time to show the Underground she was useful.

"Hey Carl!" she put on the carefree, slightly sultry voice of the typical dumb blonde. Carl looked like a man that wanted a woman (and hopefully not a man) that was easily impressed. "What brings you here?"

She gave him a radiant smile and a bubbly wave, from the look on his face, the muscles were to impress women. Time to cast the line.

"Though I'm not objecting to having such a strong, handsome man in the room."

She threw in a cheerful wink for effect as she walked over. His demeanour instantly shifted as he turned to face her properly and ran his eyes over her. This was going to be too easy.

"Well hello there beautiful."

Ok, this wasn't going to be easy. The husky tone he'd just put on left her struggling not to burst into laughter. It didn't get any easier as he continued on.

"I just dropped by to remind my buddy Torn here that he owes Krew some eco ore and needs to pay up soon."

Lyra's task of not collapsing in hysterics only got harder as Torn shot Jak a questioning look and Jak replied with a shrug and an equally confused glance in her direction. It concerned her that the only one with a hint of recognition for what was going on seemed to be Daxter.

She slapped a standard impressed look on her face while she collected her thoughts. Krew was important, or at least Carl liked to think Krew was important. She could work with that.

"So you work for Krew? Impressive."

Carl gave her an uncaring shrug as if it were nothing. She was almost impressed with the acting until a look of victory crept over his face. She found herself sorely tempted to snatch that victory away. It may have been the impression she was going for, but it simply wasn't flattering to assume a woman was quite THAT easy.

"Pays the bills, and I get to meet beautiful girls."

The suggestive leer he gave Lyra left her torn between retching and giving in to the laughter. It never ceased to amazed her how sure men could be that a woman found them attractive.

Well, regardless, the line had been cast and he'd taken the bait. Time for the hook.

She moved slowly towards him, swaying her hips a little more than she should, but as suspected this moron didn't notice how overly exaggerated it was, despite the fact that he was staring at her waist. She ran her hand slowly, sensually, up his arm and took on a shy, flirtatious smile.

"Can I tell you a secret Carl?"

"Of course you can beautiful."

As he leaned in closer it struck her that this lecher still hadn't bothered to ask her name. Eugh.

"I think you're dangerous...I like dangerous men."

"Oh I'm dangerous baby."

His hand went to her waist, far closer to her thigh than it had any right to be.

_'There are limits, dearest Carl, don't push them.'_

She stopped the look of revulsion reaching her face with great effort.

Fortunately, Torn finally interrupted. She'd been expecting someone to step in much sooner.

"You're not here to chat up my recruits Carl. Deliver the rest of your message and get out."

The look on Carl's face suggested for a moment that all of Lyra's work to stop this ending in a nasty fight had been for nothing. Fortunately Carl had noticed Jak in the doorway and had enough sense to know when he was outnumbered. Lyra resisted the urge to break one of his fingers when his grip on her thigh tightened as he let out an annoyed grunt.

"Fine, Krew wants his eco tomorrow or you're paying in blood."

Torn clearly wasn't happy about the deadline or the threat.

"We'll have your eco ore the day after tomorrow, you can have it then."

"Not good enough Torn. I said tomorrow."

"And I said-"

"Boys!"

For crying out loud, did she have to do everything all of a sudden?

She looked up at Carl with the same coy, shy smile as before.

"If you give us two days instead of one, I'll come along for the delivery."

The amount of seduction she put into her voice was almost embarrassing, but this clearly wasn't a man who understood subtle. Obviously it was enough, a tempted look crossed his face.

"I dunno beautiful...Krew wants it tomorrow."

Torn was about to owe her bigtime.

"I'd be ever so grateful if you could hold it off for a day, maybe we could go for a drink afterwards to celebrate our lucky meeting?"

Bigtime.

This seemed to decide it for Carl though. He gave her thigh a squeeze before he let go.

"Sure thing beautiful. See you then."

BIGTIME!

She looked between Torn and Jak once Carl had left, it had been nearly a minute and the room had just remained in awkward silence. Both of them looked confused, and angry.

_'Oh the broody brothers look angry...big shock.'_

It took another minute for Lyra to realise that even considering she was definitely about to get a lecture, she had a limit for how long she could stand uncomfortable silences. She decided to break it with a joke in the hope of it lessening the impending rant.

_'Ha, as if anything could.'_

"Why are you both staring at me like that? Is there something in my teeth?"

Jak responded first.

"I dunno, did you chip one of them when you threw yourself at him?"

Then, wonderfully, Torn found his voice. Though with the way Torn spoke in general, she suspected he'd lost part of it quite a while ago.

"What was that rookie?"

Both sounded less than impressed.

_'Ah wonderful, they're going to team up for this lecture.'_

She decided her best chance was to keep this as brief as possible.

"He's gone, nobody got hurt and you got your extra day to pay Krew, whoever that is. You should be thanking me, so what's the problem?"

When Torn set his face into a scowl and almost started going red with annoyance, Lyra began to suspect that wasn't the correct answer to keep the conversation short. Naturally, Jak spoke next in what seemed to be the anger tag team they had going.

"The problem is that this is a resistance, not a brothel."

Lyra noticed the shift in the room. Jak almost looked like he was about clap his hands over his mouth, Torn and Dax suddenly found something incredibly interesting on the ceiling, It appeared Dax needed to leave Jak's shoulder to inspect it properly.

Nobody knew how she'd react to that comment, but everyone suspected it was going to be bad. This was her chance to put them on the defensive and she hated the idea of more lecturing too much not to take it. She twisted her features to look as hurt and angry as she possibly could and turned the volume up on her voice. It didn't hurt the act that she was actually fairly angry.

"I am NOT a whore! How DARE you! I was flirting with him to help the Underground. FLIRTING Jak."

She may have pushed it a bit far, or he might just hate being yelled at. Either way, he also found the volume button for his voice.

"Really? You're not a whore? Because earlier you literally threw yourself at me and attached yourself to my face, now you've just finished practically dry humping another guy you've barely met. I gotta wonder..."

_'Oh broody, you just crossed a line.'_

"I'm not interested in him, I was trying to help the Underground. And earlier was due to the yellow eco. I hardly think you're in a position to judge how people act with eco in their system, I mean seriously, Pot, meet Kettle!"

She noticed with some satisfaction that he almost physically recoiled when those words hit him. He recovered before she could push the advantage though, and glared around the room.

"Who told her?"

Whatever had been on the ceiling had obviously fallen to the floor, and Dax was still absolutely _fascinated_ by it as he slowly raised his hand.

"I may have uh...mentioned it..."

Jak gave him a look that spelled an impending telling off for Dax and to Lyra's surprise she actually felt rather sorry for him.

"Hey, broody!"

She almost laughed when Jak and Torn both looked up at her in response.

"Jak." she clarified "You're not my superior, you're not my father, you're not my brother and you're not my boyfriend. That means you can keep your opinions on who I flirt with and why to yourself. Got it?"

And his rage was focused on her again. Luckily for Dax, she didn't miss the thankful nod the little...whatever he was, gave her.

Jak hadn't started yelling again, so this seemed the perfect time to make her exit. She started heading back to Tess's room, making sure Jak and Torn were aware she wasn't happy with their lack of gratitude by presenting them each with a middle finger on the way. It was strange how satisfying it was to be able to do that without outraged gasps and lectures from her mother on how unladylike such behaviour was. So satisfying in fact, she turned around in the hall and did it again.

_'Oh how incredibly childish I must look...totally worth it.'_

* * *

**A/N**

Here's the longer chapter that I promised, much later than I promised. Unfortunately my internet connection was not compliant with my desires. Normally in such a situation I'd offer another chapter by way of apology but unfortunately the next few chapters have some in game dialogue that I needed an internet connection to get right, so the last week has been an all round massive setback for my story and all I have to offer are apologies and biscuits. (You can't actually have biscuits, they're mine.)

Lyra and Jak's first argument, with more to come. Will they develop a more cordial relationship? Will an argument end in a fiery night of passionate, angry bedroom antics? Will Jak just shoot her in the face and bring the story to an undignified ending? Who knows, I'm not even sure I do. Well right now Jak doesn't have a gun, so I guess we can rule that out for a while, still...the guy's resourceful when it comes to killing people.

Hope you enjoyed it;


	11. Chapter 11

The wind was taken somewhat out of her sails when Lyra began storming her way towards Tess's room, only to hear the woman in another room giggling like she'd inhaled several cannisters of laughing gas.

Lyra opened the door to a room she'd previously assumed to be storage or someone else's private quarters, prepared to interrupt the maniacal laughter with an angry rant about how unreasonable Jak and Torn had been, only to stop when she saw Tess surrounded by several screens that appeared to have live feeds of various areas of the base.

"Oh hi sweetie" Tess managed as she struggled to compose herself. "Good job with Carl just now."

The angry rant dissipated completely as Lyra realised that she'd seen the whole thing and so didn't need to be told exactly what had happened.

"Tell that to Jak and Torn." she muttered

Ok, so the rant hadn't dissipated entirely. In fact there was still a fair bit of it left.

"You'd think they'd be grateful to me for putting up wit that guy to do them a favour. But no, instead Jak decides to call me a whore."

Tess managed a remarkably convincing sympathetic look for someone who was still fighting back another fit of giggles.

"I know sweetie" she replied in gentle tones "He's new to this in a lot of ways, he doesn't understand that sometimes you have to lie and do things you'd rather not do in order to keep everything running smoothly. Give him some time, Dax will explain it and he'll probably feel like a bit of an idiot. Of course, after that dark eco jab, he'll never admit it. Be careful throwing that in his face, it's a touchy subject."

She shouldn't have said it, Lyra had known that the moment the moment the words had passed her lips. Apart from knowing full well that it was likely to completely destroy her uneasy truce with Jak, it had gotten Dax in trouble, and Dax had trusted her with something very personal to 'his boy' in the hopes that it would help her understand him better. Perhaps, just maybe, an apology was required for that comment. Though he did start it with the yellow eco comment, which it had been silently agreed he'd forgiven her for. But then if she hadn't attached herself to his face it wouldn't have been an issue. The other girls back home were right...kissing made everything complicated. But it shouldn't count if neither of the people kissing had wanted to do it, right? Well, _she_ had wanted to do it, but that was the yellow eco talking...ok, not so much talking as acting. That didn't count, did it? And it's not like she fancied him _at all_ without yellow eco running through her system. It wasn't like when they were arguing she'd been torn between how rude he was and how sexy he looked when he was angry. And she'd only conjured up the yellow eco fuelled mental image of him showering a second time because she wanted to check that it was the purely the yellow eco that made her find him attractive. There must have still been some in her system when he found her outside the fortress too, because the mental image of him naked and muscular and drops of water running over his lean, defined frame...where was she going with that? Oh yes! It had done nothing for her the second time she thought about it. Nothing whatsoever. And that was why she knew it was fine that she was picturing it again now, and probably would at least three more times today. Because this absolutely was not a crush, because he absolutely was not hot in a moody, infuriating way.

"Uh, Lyra?"

Lyra snapped back to reality at the cautious verbal nudge from Tess.

"Yes?"

"You zoned out a little bit there sweety."

_'It's easy to let happen, considering how much I don't have a crush on Jak.'_

Best not reply with that.

"Oh, uh, yes, just thinking. Sorry Tess."

"About who?"

The knowing smile Tess asked with was unnerving, Lyra tried replying with a dismissive 'don't be stupid' look, but Tess continued.

"You were blushing quite a lot, and your eyes had a bit of a dreamy, faraway glaze."

_'Yes, well, it's embarrassing how unattractive he is...and I was uh...trying to get away from him in my mind. Because he's unattractive. Change the topic!'_

"So Tess" Lyra said, only slightly too quickly "Jak's new, why didn't Torn like it?"

"Oh" Tess gave a dismissive wave "Torn doesn't really understand the power of feminine charms but he's fine with it as long as you get results. He would have been annoyed that you assigned yourself a mission dating the enemy. Or any mission really. Or a date come to think of it. He's not big on anyone having a social life."

"Big surprise there." Lyra scoffed "I get the impression he doesn't like me very much. I suppose I haven't done much for him to like."

"Don't bet on it" Tess said with an encouraging smile "You can't be blamed for your eco abilities, and if you get better with them they could be very useful. Other than that, you showed initiative and you got results. Plus you stood your ground against Jak. That was Torn's impressed angry voice."

Lyra had to wonder if she'd missed out on some kind of super sensitive hearing that came with being born with the long pointy ears. It had just sounded angry to her.

"How you can tell it was his impressed angry voice?"

Tess shrugged casually. "Nobody got shot."

"Nobody got..." Lyra's face paled as she repeated the words "He does that?!"

"Oh, no" Tess giggled again "Not really, but if he's just angry he'll usually shoot the floor near you to make it known. He let you off pretty easy anyway, so he was more impressed than annoyed."

Lyra found it surprisingly easy to talk to Tess, there was something about her that was disarming. It would have made her cautious in a different situation, people you felt comfortable around could gain information from you far too easily, but here she had no secrets of consequence that Tess didn't already know. And that was liberating. Lyra was surprised to realise just how liberating it really was. She could actually indulge in the bit of gossip they were enjoying without concern that she'd let something slip, open up to her without fear of it being used against her family. Sadly, it ended all too soon.

"I have to get to work Lyra" Tess explained as she stood up and began gathering her things "My shift starts soon, I'll probably be there until the weekend."

"You work outside the Underground?" Lyra asked

"Yes" Tess replied as she left, pausing briefly at the door and turning "It goes without saying, if you see me at work, you don't recognise me."

Lyra nodded and Tess gave her a brief smile as she turned again and left.

In the following silence, Lyra heard grunts and crashing sounds coming from down the hall. It sounded like Jak was in the training room again, that was the second time in a day. Either he was very committed to training or she had a talent for making him angry. Probably a bit of both, she decided.

Now that Tess was gone she found herself somewhat at a loss for what she could do for the rest of the day. She had been hoping to get some exercise and practice on the training dummies, but Jak seemed to be rather territorial when he was in a bad mood (which seemed to be always) so Lyra decided she probably wouldn't be welcome there. Dax would probably be with Jak, the two seemed to be close friends, though for the life of her Lyra wasn't sure how Jak would make a friend. Perhaps he'd saved Dax's life? Or maybe the talking furball had seen Jak shortly after birth. She didn't even know what species Dax was, it was entirely possible they imprinted on the first face they saw. Asking how a friendship started with the grumpy green haired wonder probably wasn't a smart move if said grumpy green haired wonder would be in the room, so the answer to that question would have to wait.

That left...Torn.

Lyra sighed as she realised those were her options. Sit in Tess's room on her own, risk Jak's company or talk to Torn.

* * *

Authors Note

I humbly offer this new chapter with sincere apologies that it's taken so damn long, and that the chapter is nothing spectacular. Life has been seriously getting in the way of writing and it seems it will continue to do just that. I'm starting a work trial (8 weeks of working my arse off for free to try and get a job at the end of it) and sending my computer off for repairs and such before the warranty expires and I have to pay for all the little fixes it needs. I'll write whenever I can in the meantime and if I can't upload as I go, I'll try and do it so you get more than one measly chapter at a time.

Thank you for your continued support.


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